Aggravated by higher food prices, the country's retail inflation rose to a three-month high of 8.59 per cent in April from 8.31 per cent in the previous month, according to official data released here today.

The data released by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) said the Consumer Price Indices (CPI) based inflation rates for rural and urban areas for April 2014 were 9.25 per cent and 7.69 per cent, respectively.

Inflation rates for rural and urban areas for March 2014 were 8.89 per cent and 7.51 per cent, respectively.

The Reserve Bank had chosen to keep the policy rate (repo) unchanged at 8 per cent in its April monetary policy review as retail inflation was “sticky”.